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Week of September 7, 2015

“Their early work was a little too new wave for my tastes, but when Sports came out in ’83, I think they really came into their own, commercially and artistically. The whole album has a clear, crisp sound, and a new sheen of consummate professionalism that really gives the songs a big boost. He’s been compared to Elvis Costello, but I think Huey has a far more bitter, cynical sense of humor.”

Story Update: Tom Brady, Still a Bimbo

Around the Super Bowl last year we brought you a story about Tom Brady and we wondered aloud: Is Tom Brady a bimbo? We answered our own question with a resounding “yes”. This week, fuel was added to our Tom Brady as bimbo fire, as Brady’s locker was spotted with a Donald Trump “Make America Great Again” hat. After the photo went viral, people wondered if Brady’s owned the hat seriously. The answer: Another resounding “yes”. In response to the question, Brady said this week that Trump is Brady’s “good friend” and that Trump “has done amazing things.” Once again, 1-2-3 Sports can confirm: Tom Brady is a bimbo. -TOB

PAL: Trump is the DNC’s secret weapon. Is Billy Clinton still the maestro?

Home Court

No surprise that the NY Times is at the cutting edge of multimedia stories. Here’s yet another example of a clear concept executed to perfection. This story is a series of short, narrated vignettes about the home courts of tennis greats set to the moving images of a typical day. Here is the neighborhood court where Andy Murray, Serena & Venus, Federer, Sharapova, and more first honed their craft. This feature is remarkable in its simplicity, and I love it. – PAL

TOB: Really cool. One thing I like about tennis, as opposed to golf, is that while it seems like an upper-crust sport, it does not take a lot of money to play tennis, and so many of the great tennis stars have come from very modest backgrounds. That fact is well illustrated here by NYT.

Finding a Diamond in the Rough

For NFL teams, finding a good quarterback has always been difficult. The speed of the NFL game is so much faster than the college game that many great college quarterbacks have flamed out in the NFL. NFL coaches, though, fear it is getting worse. With the proliferation of spread and hurry-up offenses throughout college football, quarterbacks are not being prepared to face NFL defenses. The idea behind the hurry-up offense is not to fool defenses, but to run simple plays, over and over so that the offense perfectly executes the plays, and to do them quickly, to prevent defenses from having the opportunity to adjust or substitute players. College coaches using these offenses do not concern themselves with preparing their quarterbacks for the NFL – they do not see themselves as a minor league for the NFL. They want to win. Baylor is a perfect example – Bryce Petty entered the NFL this year after two great, record-breaking seasons at Baylor. But when quizzed by NFL coaches prior to the draft, he couldn’t identify even the most basic football concepts that any NFL quarterback should understand. And that’s because no one ever taught him. Understandably, NFL teams are terrified of what this could mean for the future of finding elite quarterbacks and they do not have a plan. I do think college coaches should be wary, though: If high school quarterbacks start to realize that these offenses are not preparing them for the NFL, the recruiting wells could begin to dry up for those schools. -TOB

PAL Note: So you’re telling me that the NFL has to coach its players? On a macro-level, it’s an interesting notion that the premier league (NFL) has to adapt to trends surfacing in what is essentially its farm system (college football).

TOB: But I get it. If you’re going to risk your job and pay millions to a player at the most important position in your sport, you’d hope that they understand the difference between a Cover-2 and a Cover-3, something someone who has played even a little bit of Madden understands, but somehow one of the best college quarterbacks in the country could not do.

PAL: Is Madden a new Settlers of Catan spin-off?

Jarryd Hayne: One of a Kind (?)

Perhaps the one bright spot in what has become an atrocious offseason of historical proportions for the 49ers is Jarryd Hayne. By some, he’s considered the Michael Jordan of the National Rugby League (Australia & New Zealand). Like Jordan, Hayne left his sport in his prime to pursue another sport – the NFL. It’s still unknown whether or not Hayne will make the gameday roster, but he’s shown enough in the preseason to at least start on the practice squad. This story breaks down how Hayne’s rugby talents are unique in their application to football, which are not likely to be followed by other rugby stars. Cool story, and I’m rooting for him. – PAL

TOB: Very astute question mark in the title there by my main man, Phil. I don’t get why Dator wrote this. He is strongly discouraging other rugby players from even attempting what Hayne is trying to do. But why? Maybe he’s right. Maybe Hayne is unique in the rugby world in his ability to make an NFL roster. So what? If a rugby player attempts and fails to make the NFL, can he not go back? Dator writes as though the player cannot, which is silly. It’s also silly to suggest that there are literally no rugby players from Australia (or elsewhere) that have the skillset/talent to make the NFL. Hayne is half Fijian, a Polynesian country. There have been Polynesian players in the NFL for decades – great ones, too. Players like Troy Polamalu, Haloti Ngata, Mike Iupati, Jesse Sapolu, Mark Tuinei, and of course Junior Seau. Polynesian players in Australia and elsewhere excel in rugby, and there is no reason those same athletes can’t follow in the footsteps of guys like Seau and Polamalu and have an impact in the NFL.

Video of the Week

Our first 1-2-3 Sports Poll. Which wiffle ball catch is more impressive:

“What came first, the music or the misery? People worry about kids playing with guns, or watching violent videos, that some sort of culture of violence will take them over. Nobody worries about kids listening to thousands, literally thousands of songs about heartbreak, rejection, pain, misery and loss. Did I listen to pop music because I was miserable? Or was I miserable because I listened to pop music?”